In the summer of 2016, the then Social Protection Minister Leo Varadkar travelled to west Cork to meet his party colleague and local Fine Gael TD Jim Daly.
The visit would see them take to the waters in a boat off the scenic south coast.
While they wore sunglasses their political vision for the future was bright and sharp.
Jim Daly would become the first Cork TD to back Minister Varadkar as a future party leader ahead of his fellow county man Simon Coveney.
He was most certainly on board for the Varadkar voyage that lay ahead.
Within a year, Leo Varadkar was Taoiseach and Jim Daly was a high ranking Junior Minister at the Department of Health.
Somewhere along the way though the Cork minister of state has gone from being a close ally to someone who gets publicly slapped down by the Taoiseach.
Taoiseach: Minister's remarks on SF 'not appropriate'
Think back to public rebuke of Jim Daly when he said pensioners should keep their heating on 24/7 when the snow fell early this year.
The Taoiseach told the Dáil that was not the advice of Government.
There was a similar put-down to an idea from the Junior Minister that PPS numbers should be used by social media companies to verify users' ages.
Now, Jim Daly's comments to Hot Press that he has no difficulty in principle to Sinn Féin being part of a Government with Fine Gael have landed him in trouble again.
However, he did add it would be very difficult to agree such a Programme for Government.
It's unlikely that qualification will quell the anger in Government Buildings or indeed across Fine Gael.
The Taoiseach's spokesperson has already lambasted the comments saying they were not appropriate.
Others in the parliamentary party have spoken privately in more colourful terms about their opposing view to what Jim Daly said.
That's because this is very serious for many in the party who fear the possibility of a future coalition with Sinn Féin would be damaging in a General Election campaign.
And their minds are absolutely focused on that contest for the simple reason that it's almost certainly less than a year away.
